Education

Experience

I've TA-ed four astronomy classes during my time at UCSC which has left me very comfortable with the material. Last summer I designed and taught Astronomy 2 (Intro to Astronomy) to a class of 20 students and received rave reviews from all of them for my focus on active learning and student engagement during class. I was the recipient of the Astrophysics department's award for 'Excellence in Teaching' my first year here and continue to receive excellent reviews from both the professors and students I work with every year.

My career goal is to work in outreach education and curriculum design, trying to teach the general public more about science and its possibilities, so teaching is an important part of my life. I love working with students and finding innovative ways to explain concepts in order to help them create an enduring understanding of the material. I'm the creator and instructor of the Astrophysics department's 4 week TA training course, which is required of all incoming PhD students. Helping to train new PhD students to become better educators keeps my knowledge of teaching pedagogy and the best ways to work with students of different learning styles current and very well tested!

Hobbies

I'm a big people person and my favorite hobby is dance. I coach the UCSC ballroom dance team and danced competitively all through college and now graduate school. I also do a lot of west coast swing events in the bay area.

I'm very energetic and enjoy working through all of the interesting topics covered in astronomy classes. I encourage lots of conversations during my teaching and work hard to make students to feel safe expressing questions or concepts they're struggling with.